$686 Million for Alaskan "Bridge to Nowh
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| Thu, 02-12-2009 - 2:13pm |
$686 Million for Alaskan "Bridge to Nowhere"
A bridge connecting downtown Anchorage with a sparsely populated corner of Alaska's Mat-Su Borough would cost an estimated $686 million, according to a consultant's estimate prepared for the 49th state's Department of Transportation.
In September of 2007, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has canceled one of the bridges, which would have linked Ketchikan with neighboring Gravina Island.
But the Knik Arm project has continued to move forward.
"It says the Knik crossing project is laced with pricey, hard to anticipate risks that will have to be shared by the eventual, privately financed contractor and the 'owner' -- the state and the bridge authority -- if the crossing is to be feasible," the Anchorage Daily News reported on Wednesday.
The state's estimate pegs at $373 million the cost of building a two-lane bridge extending from near the Port of Anchorage to virtually unpopulated Point MacKenzie.
An additional $214 million would be required for roads on the Anchorage side, along with $99 million for roads on the Mat-Su side of the bridge.
The estimate did not furnish a worst-case/best-case cost range. However, the report did conclude that "(t)he design and construction risks for this project are extraordinarily high."
"At a time of declining oil revenues and federal funding for transportation, the state should not undertake a project of this scale with its 'extraordinarily high' financial risks," said Lois Epstein, director of the Alaska Transportation Priorities Project, a watchdog group.
Mark Claman, Anchorage's Acting Mayor, told the Daily News, "I've always said the economic case for the bridge hasn't been made."
Full article at: http://blog.seattlepi.nwsource.com/seattlepolitics/archives/161823.asp






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Nobody is spending 20 million to save a mouse.
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